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Foster Mom Wins Suit In Cross-race Adoption

July 14, 1999|By From Tribune News Services.

WEST PALM BEACH, FLORIDA — Ending a long legal battle, Florida has let a white woman adopt the 4-year-old black boy she has raised since birth, and will pay her $135,000 in legal costs for her discrimination lawsuit.

Under a settlement approved Monday, the Department of Children and Families apologized to Shirley Fitzgerald, 63, and acknowledged it made a mistake in trying to place the boy with black relatives whom Fitzgerald said ignored his medical needs.

The boy, named Shaq was born to a drug-addicted woman and has asthma, epilepsy, damaged hearing and delayed speech development.

Fitzgerald, of Palm Beach Gardens, is a longtime foster parent for children with medical problems. The state placed Shaq with her days after he was born; he was HIV-positive at the time but tested negative a year later.